Barbara Tallent

Co-founder

Tools LiveBinders Is Using

BI / Analytics

Reviews

We chose Google Analytics initially because it was free, but on top of that, it has really grown with us; they add the features that we need, as we need them. We’re actually planning to interface with them to provide their analytics to our customers.

Communication & Collaboration

Reviews

We conduct all of our meetings, both internal and consumer meetings, on Google Hangouts. We chose it because it's free. We’re bootstrapped, so we always like free. And really, it just works great for us. We did have a problem early on with an unwanted and uninvited person showing up in a meeting, but Google seems to have plugged that hole, and we haven’t had a problem since.

Credit Card Processing

Reviews

We have a love/hate relationship with PayPal. I love it because we don’t have to worry about storing anyone’s credit card information. But it can be frustrating when working with customers who don’t like it and refuse to use it. In those cases, they’ll send us a check, and it’s not a huge deal, but the fact that there are customers who feel so strongly against it does create a bit of work for us.

Customer Service

Reviews

I love TeamSupport. It’s a really great product, inexpensive to get started and very easy to start using. They’ve also grown with us. At the beginning, they didn’t have many features, and we didn’t need many features. But as we’ve grown, and they’ve grown, they’ve added the features we’ve needed as we need them.

Email Marketing

Reviews

We now send out emails using Postmark. Our software is interfaced with Postmark, which makes everything more streamlined than using something like VerticalResponse, which we had used for a while in the beginning.

File Sharing

Reviews

LiveBinders is really easy to use, and we all know how to use it, so it’s the natural choice for us. All of our customer training materials are organized in binders; it is really easy to copy and then customize the binder for a new customer. Additionally, each feature request has its own binder filled with user stories, screen mockups, examples of how other products provide the feature, and technical specifications. Once a feature is complete, the binder moves from the “To Do” shelf to the “Done” shelf so that we have a nice history of everything we have added.

Finance & Accounting

Reviews

We use QuickBooks Desktop. My partner picked it up quickly with little accounting experience, so it seems to be quite straightforward to learn and start using. I would like to see us to switch to QuickBooks Online, but it hasn’t happened yet. But we've been happy with QuickBooks Desktop so far.

Hiring

Reviews

Other

Reviews

I found UserTesting via my network, and I have since spread it through the rest of my network. We use it to test our website and software any time we make a major change. They have an extensive database of users that are on call, and you just pick the demographics of the users you want (e.g., one teacher, one student, one businessperson). Then the testers record a video of themselves testing, and they voiceover what they’re thinking as they go through your website/use your software. It’s a priceless resource for us, and it’s inexpensive, which is a great bonus.